Bus contracts rescued, layoffs avoided

Wednesday

Sep 11, 2013 at 12:01 AM

John Christensen

A personal call to the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Administrator Peter Rogoff from U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer will save about 50 jobs at Penn Yan bus manufacturer Coach & Equipment. The manufacturer of small buses had nearly doubled the size of its union manufacturing workforce this year by hiring 40 full-time workers to meet the demand of new bus orders over the remainder of 2013 – contracts which were cancelled due to new FTA procurement regulations that took effect in July.

Before Schumer's intervention, Coach & Equipment would have had to lay-off about 50 employees, nearly half of its manufacturing workforce, had the contracts remained cancelled. Rogoff confirmed Coach & Equipment would be granted an exemption from these new regulations to allow them the rest of 2013 to finish up already agreed-upon orders from bus authorities in states like Massachusetts and Maryland, and maintain their current workforce. Schumer says Coach & Equipment also will be able to move forward with plans to expand into a new 10,000 square foot satellite facility at Keuka Business Park.

"I have nothing against the new FTA regulations, but they unfairly delayed or disallowed agreements that were already in place, and threatened workers who had already been hired," said Schumer. "Allowing these agreements to move forward, and giving the industry time to comply with the brand new regulations, was a smart and practical decision by the FTA," he added, "and I thank Administrator Rogoff. Now, Coach & Equipment, and 50 Penn Yan employees are back in the driver's seat for the expansion of their production this year."

Coach & Equipment President Scott Reston says, "It isn't a completely done deal yet, but the FTA has agreed and the individual transit authorities have agreed. We just have to wait for the FTA to inform the regional councils of their decision and sign off on the funds." Reston explained that this is all a matter of funding. "As much as 80 percent of the cost of the buses can come from the FTA. Without that funding, the local authorities can't go ahead with the contracts." He gives credit and thanks to Schumer for helping the FTA see the problem with their ruling. "They didn't realize the real world implications that decision would have on the manufacturers and their employees."

Steve Griffin, CEO of Yates County's Finger Lakes Economic Development Center, said Schumer and his staff had worked closely with Reston to make sure the existing contracts could still go through. "Schumer was absolutely helpful," said Griffin. "This is good for Coach & Equipment and good for the area." He added that the company has leased the 10,000 square foot Canandaigua Building in The Keuka Business Park to make small modifications on the buses to meet individual state DOT requirements. Coach & Equipment had been leasing space in a building less than half that size until this contract was signed.

Coach & Equipment makes small paratransit buses for public bus authorities, and is one of the largest employers in Yates County. Earlier this year, Coach had rehired 40 UAW union workers based on new bus orders it expected to receive, totaling $25 million, from customers, specifically bus authorities in states like Massachusetts and Maryland. For the past several years, the FTA has permitted other states and bus authorities to purchase new buses through the State of Minnesota Cooperative Purchasing Venture, which meets all the federal procurement regulations, by piggy-backing on their contract. The State of Massachusetts and Maryland had planned to purchase Coach buses via the Minnesota Cooperative Purchasing Venture since they were members of the Minnesota Cooperative Purchasing Venture consortium.

But in July, the FTA changed its policy to bar states who had been members of the consortium from purchasing buses through Minnesota's federal contract, instead requiring them to seek their own procurement contracts, which could take a significant amount of time to set up. In the interim, the purchase orders Coach had received would have been put on hold, forcing them to lay-off potentially 50 employees, or half its current workforce.

In his call, Schumer argued that states needed time to comply with the new policy, and while they do so, the companies who had already secured purchase orders like Coach Bus should not be punished. Schumer pressed him to grandfather the policy in for Coach & Equipment, as they had done for one of Coach's competitors, so that they may complete the orders they already received and keep the new hires they made in anticipation of the contracts.

Coach & Equipment Manufacturing Corp. is well known for making the "sturdy workhorse" of the mid-sized bus industry, manufacturing small and mid-sized buses for public bus authorities at their new 85,000 square foot, state-of-the-art manufacturing plant in Penn Yan. Their bus building roots go back to the late 1890's, first as Whitfield Body Builders (1895) and then as Penn Yan Bodies in 1928. In 1948, a former president of Penn Yan Bodies founded Coach & Equipment Manufacturing Corp., with a focus on small buses.

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